How to become more well-connected | Jared Kleinert | Big Think

How to become more well-connected

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Meeting people is easy. Just ask award-winning author and "most connected millennial" Jared Kleinert, who has boiled down the fine art of networking into 3 easy steps. Because just about anyone can reach out to another person, but it's what you bring to the table that matters. Jared's latest book is 3 Billion Under 30.

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JARED KLEINERT:

Jared Kleinert is an entrepreneur, TED and keynote speaker and award-winning author of two books (most recently 3 Billion Under 30) who’s been named USA Today’s “Most Connected Millennial” after spending years identifying and connecting hundreds of the world’s smartest and most talented Millennials.

His first book, 2 Billion Under 20, was voted the “#1 Entrepreneurship Book of 2015” and he’s become a go-to marketing and business development consultant for venture-backed startups, Fortune 500 companies, New York Times bestselling authors, and others.

He’s been featured by almost every major media outlet including Mashable, FOX, ABC, Washington Post, Forbes, Fortune, Fast Company, and others, and the United Nations has named him a “Champion For Humanity.”

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TRANSCRIPT:

Jared Kleinert: So as an entrepreneur, as a TED and TEDx speaker, as an award winning author, and as someone who was named U.S.A Today’s “most connected millennial,” a lot of people ask me how I have built my network and how I connect with people.

And so I’ll give you the high level and then I’ll go into maybe a few specifics that you can use today to build a world-class network in record time.

At a high level I would think about networking in three basic steps. Step one, which shouldn’t even have to be told or shared, is that you should be a good person in the whole process of building your relationship, which is probably easy at first.

You bump into someone at a coffee shop or an event. Obviously you want to treat them with respect, “treat them like you would treat your mom” is something I was told recently that I really like, and shows like a level of respect that you should have for someone regardless of who they look like or who they are or anything like that.

Just treat everyone the same, be a good person, and if you are coming from that frame of mind as opposed to being selfish or trying to win a quick contract over someone, I think you’ll have a much better job long-term in terms of building your network.

And as you become a super connector you’re going to want to be more intentional about how you spend your time.

And so there’s going to be more people reaching out to you, trying to connect with you, and it’s important to treat them respectfully and be a good person with maybe someone who is less knowledgeable than you reaching out— even if you can’t spent a lot of time with them.

There’s a respectful way to say “no” or there’s a respectful way to talk to anyone regardless of if you end up spending time with them or not.

So step one, be a good person.

Step two is to provide value up front.

As you are building friendships, connecting with people it’s important to ask about what they care about and what they’re working on and what’s keeping them up at night.

See if you can offer connections or offer time or resources in order to move their agenda forward. And this is the same in marketing.

You want to offer a potential customer value before you try and ask them for money or ask them for value in return. It’s the same with sales. You have to build rapport and really establish a relationship.

But it’s important with mentors as well because a lot of times if you’re reaching out to find a mentor or you’re reaching out to someone important in your industry, they’re fielding a lot of the same sort of requests from other individuals who want their time and want their expertise. And so you could stand out by looking to offer value to them and actually being proactive about what it is they’re working on.

For example, I reach out to New York Times bestseller authors right before they’re about to come out with another book. And so I know that they are looking for introductions to press, I know that they are really busy, and so anything I can do to help them advance the book that they’re working on or save them time is really valuable to them.

And so I would think about always being a good person, providing value up front.

And then number three is being intentional...

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